The nation’s leading federal laboratory in research and development of renewable energy has struck a $100 million agreement with oil and gas giant ExxonMobil to pursue new breakthroughs in low-emission energy technologies.

The investment, announced this week, is the largest from an external partner in the National Renewable Energy Laboratory’s history. About 80 percent of the Golden-based lab’s funding comes from the Department of Energy, which owns it.

Bill Farris, NREL’s associate lab director, said Thursday that the agreement with ExxonMobil and the National Energy Technology Laboratory caps several months of discussions about building on their partnership. He said scientists from all the entities will tackle the dual challenge of providing energy for a growing global population while reducing carbon dioxide emissions.

The collaboration is in the vein of NREL’s other partnerships, with the lab conducting cutting-edge research and helping spark the practical application of technologies. To date, more than 550 patents have been issued for NREL technologies.

The lab has 817 active partnerships with industry, universities, foundations and governments.

“Exxon envisions a lot of their researchers being sent to NREL. It increases the speed of collaboration,” Farris said.

Dennis Schroeder, NREL

NREL scientists Frederick Baddour and Calvin Mukarakate work with a molecular beam mass spectrometer at the Fied Test Laboratory Building.

The agreement will allow ExxonMobil to work with researchers at the other 16 federal laboratories without having to go through the normal process of developing individual agreements with each one. The Golden lab will serve as the conduit.

The company will invest up to $100 million over 10 years to research and develop advanced lower-emissions technologies with NREL and the National Energy Technology Laboratory, ExxonMobil spokeswoman Ashley Alemayehu said in an email.

“Ultimately, our goal is to advance the fundamental science and to demonstrate scale,” Alemayehu said. “For example, the partnership will explore ways to bring biofuels and carbon capture and storage to commercial scale across the transportation, power generation and industrial sectors.”

Judith Kohler joined The Denver Post in August 2018 and is part of the business team, writing about energy, aerospace, agriculture and other topics. She spent 21 years with The Associated Press, covering politics, government, energy and the environment in Colorado and Wyoming.